The other day, my grandson Emerson and I wandered through the aisles of our local thrift store, browsing all the usual treasures. Emerson found some playing cards, and I found some rubber ducks and a big bag of brightly colored plastic combs. My photographer brain saw the combs and thought, “ohhh, I can work with this.”
So off we go. Back home I dumped the whole bag onto a brown backdrop and photographed them as a glorious jumbled rainbow pile. Then I shoved them into a wooden box and shot that angle too. They looked great—but something nagged at me, the arrangements were a bit boring. I’m sure I could do something more with them.
Enter: THE ALPHABET PROJECT
After that, I started arranging a few of the combs to spell out each letter. A through Z, on a brown background. In Photoshop, I took the photos of the letters and arranged them in the names of my Granddaughters. The one for Ellie was intended to be a Birthday Card. But then I thought that the dark background was too much color for printing.
So I re-shot the whole alphabet on a white background. The contrast isn’t quite as punchy, but they’re easier to print.
With these easier-to-print versions of the letters, I put together Ellie’s Birthday Card:
Happy Birthday, Ellie! And thanks for going to the Thrift Store with me, Emerson!
And now I’m thinking that I should probably photograph the letters in lower case, too. Maybe…
